Meet Red Dwarf's The Cat; Blinker Bar Meetup

Highlights of this coming week: 

Friday: Early meetup with Manchester Nightlife, this time to new Blinker bar which I hear is highly recommended. Friday night, right in the middle of the financial area off Fountain St. 9pm. 

Sunday: Sheffield Comic Con lands Sunday at Ponds Forge Sports Centre with Danny John Jules the guest attraction. DJJ played The Cat in Brit SF comedy Red Dwarf, a well-groomed, slick talking space traveller who evolved to a man-like creature after years of evolution from a pet feline stuck on a spacecraft for millennia. The actor was also Baldy’s Lookout in Scum – the guy who lets Carlin into the coal room to fight the number 2 guy. I just learned that. There are still tickets.

There’s a certain breast – related theme to this week's post.

Blake Blossom weighed in on Popbitch’s ‘baboon vs badger’ conundrum. I asked. 

 

 

I went to support the Manchester Boob Walk on Saturday, to help document the raising of awareness of Breast Cancer, and as part of this pharma experiment. If you read to the end, you’ll see I bailed on them to try and see someone famous, who is in Manchester at the time of writing. 

Who? Angela White, one of the most prolific porn stars of the last decade, is in the UK and in fact in Manchester right now. I gathered she developed a thing for Norwegian footballer Erik Haaland during the World Cup. He currently plays for Manchester City, who had a home game against Coventry FC yesterday. (1 nil to City.) 

Well, I kept checking her Insta stories in the hope of a quick photo with her. I went to 2 different Federal Cafes, still woozy from the caraway and probably dehydration too – she’d posted being in one venue, and I went to the other – not far from where I’d left people at the Boob Walk anyway. When I arrived at each one, there was a humongous queue to get in, but I doubt that was because of Angela. It’s just a popular spot. Her next update was from The Ethiad, the Man City stadium. So I got a bus, then had a long walk. I thought this was going to be utterly futile. I was right. A further update showed she was already in, meeting the squad, slapping their hands as they went into the complex. Her last post was of the players going onto the pitch. 

I went home. 

Manchester Nightlife Meetup group met in Oast House Saturday night with a plan to check out the new Sticks’n’Sushi bar in Spinningfields. We met, but the new bar / restaurant was dead, so we tried Sexy Fish which was full. I’d have liked to stay on Spinningfields, but we moved onto Box bar, which I just don’t like, sorry. Too chavvy. Got roped into pool games that I’m dreadful at. Moved onto Blues Kitchen, of which I’ve also had my fill. I didn’t last long. 

On the way out a trans influencer called Jessica Such collared me for some video interview. I’m assuming that’ll be on Insta soon. You can guess the question. And the answer.

Manchester Boob Walk… on Caraway

A month ago I attempted to get high on caraway, a seed available in many supermarkets, while attending the Manchester Day Parade. According to Dan Nestor – author of Get High Now (Without Drugs) – this is perfectly achievable. Minor dizziness and sickness was the upshot. 

I still had half the pot, so I figured a surreal – but very meaningful – gathering might be an ideal opportunity to try it out again. 

I don’t want to overlook the purpose of the event I attended today. Saturday 5th March, Manchester held host to the Boob Walk, raising awareness of Breast Cancer. There are around 59,400 new breast cancer cases in the UK every year, that's around 160 every day, according to Cancer Research UK. 

Hence, several hundred women dressed as breasts paraded from St Peter’s Square, down Oxford Rd and into Circle Square, where alternative event Manchester Psych Fest was taking place, with a rave, trippy outfits and yoga on offer. So fuck knows what a bunch of high-as-a-kite hippies thought when a barrage of literal tits rocked up for a photoshoot. 

 

Of course, on the way, I was chugging down this half pot of caraway seeds. These, Nestor says, give a sensation that’s ‘identical to taking an aspirin for a headache, but without having the headache.’ Maybe. We met at the Library at 11. By 11:30 I’d eaten the rest of the pot. Again, maybe a slight dizziness took over. I dunno. I made sure I kept drinking water; it was still a mild September day and when you’re walking, you notice the warmth. 

At this point, I noticed someone famous was in Manchester. I wanted to see if I could snap a selfie with them, so I bailed on the boobs and bussed to a different part of Manchester. But where? And for whom? Stay tuned...

Suffragette Annie Kenny getting in on the action

These old DVDs are SAVED

7 years ago I showed off this massive film collection that I’ve been accruing since 1997. 

A lot of these films were recorded from TV in the 90s, onto Long Play VHS, then transferred to DVD in around 2006-7. The DVD recorder seemed a little faulty, though, and I didn’t seem to be able to play the discs properly after recording and finalising (almost like ‘locking the door’ on a DVD to stop any more content being recorded onto it, and to allow it to be played on other devices). Hence, most of these discs stayed in storage under my bed, as they had done for 20 years. 

In December ’25 my PC pretty much conked out, so I had to splurge on a new one. Along with presents for family and meals out, I figured I may as well invest more. I’m a tight bastard most of the year, so why not shell out more on a Blu-Ray player? They’re under £100 these days. Not to mention, an old college mate of mine had moved abroad and had left a load of DVDs and Blu-Rays at his dad’s. He kindly donated them to me. I needed something to watch them on.

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So, that month I made a purchase; my dad and I wired everything up and I tried out one of the donated Blu-Rays. Brilliant picture quality. Everything worked fine. But what about the DVD+Rs storing all those VHS films? 

Turns out, they play too. They even fast forward, rewind and pause, something my old DVD+R recorder didn’t seem to be able to do, to my frustration. I’ve enjoyed revisiting some grainy, low-quality versions of some classic movies. I’ve watched the likes of Videodrome and Psycho, both recorded from TV on Long Play (VHS tape recorded at half speed, meaning you could fit double the video time onto the tape). I find, these days, I understand the plots much more than I did in my late teens and early 20s. 

I’ve got a list of old films to revisit and I’ve tapped through a few of them. I have more to watch and am looking forward to immersing myself in some brilliant (and usually little-known) cinema.

Try the New Sticks 'n' Sushi in Spinningfields

 

Looking forward this week: 

TV and movie convention For the Love of Retro takes place this weekend in Telford, which is a little too far for me. An incredible line-up though. I could easily have spent £400 if I could be arsed with a long drive and more money on a hotel room, which I can’t. 

New bar and restaurant Sticks ‘n’ Sushi opened in Spinningfields, a Japanese / Scandinavian chain. Manchester Nightlife are headed there on Saturday for cocktails and mocktails, plus to look around a few other bars. Glamorous decor, chilled background beats, possibly the odd celeb knocking about. Come join the Meetup group. See the newest parts of the city. 4 of us so far. Will be more by the weekend.

3 Million Hits

This blog passed the 3 million hit mark yesterday. I’ve been running it since 2008. I hit 1 million in April ‘23 and 2 million in April this year. Either people are suddenly interested in my random nights out and amateur psychological musings, or there’s a whole lot of bot traffic out there. I suspect the latter. 

I annoyed Sabre from Gladiators with my grammar pedantry. 

Peter Cullen died, yet another person I could have met at one convention or another, but didn’t. I'm sure he was booked to attend at something local. He voiced the titular Predator, Eeyore the donkey from Whinnie the Pooh and Optimus Prime in the 1984 animated Transformers: The Movie. 

It’s a bank holiday tomorrow and I predictably have put up a last minute meetup for tonight: drinks on Deansgate, if that floats your boat. I always forget when it’s a bank holiday, and no other organiser on Meetup seems to put much up either. There’s a women’s cinema trip, a live music acoustic set in a pub, a bouldering session and a 70s disco night – great if that’s your thing – but not much else. I guess it’s down to me. 9pm, Slug and Lettuce Deansgate, 9pm.

 

This Machinist Diet is starting to get painful.

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2 weeks ago I started this Machinist Diet: an attempt to eat like Christian Bale did in preparation for his role as an anorexic insomniac. My goal isn't to look like him - it's to hit 72.2kg. 

It’s taking a lot longer than I thought, although it’s really starting to hurt now. Yesterday I just had tuna and apple for lunch, with no other meal all day. Then I blasted through circuit class as best as I could. This morning I did pump, sauna and steam. I’m about to eat again now. I’m still 82.4kg, a very minor reduction considering how little I’ve eaten and how much exercise I’ve done. Both my skipping ropes snapped on Thursday, so I bought 2 more, much sturdier this time. 

One thing I’ve noticed on The Machinist Diet – you don’t have to clean the kitchen anywhere near as much. Hardly any food prep or consumption happens in it. I still have a load of soup to eat, plus stuff in my freezer. I’m out of milk, protein drinks, cheese and eggs. 

Oh, also, I watched all the (very interesting) extras on The Machinist DVD. 

Let’s see what happens next...